This commentary is by Elena Mihaly, vice president of Conservation Law Foundation Vermont.
As an environmental lawyer, I’m often the killjoy at the party telling people to stop using product X because it causes water pollution or stop feeding Y to their kids because it’s full of heavy metals. I’ve also been mockingly labeled the “PFAS police” in my family as I work to eliminate products in our household containing this toxic forever chemical.
My latest campaign is for the bees. Scientists are finding neonicotinoids — synthetic, neurotoxic pesticides that kill pollinators like bees at alarmingly low doses — everywhere: in most pregnant women, in white-tailed deer, in farmland with no history of neonicotinoid use, in water and in pollen collected by honeybees.
Neonicotinoids contribute to widespread pollinator declines that threaten our entire food system. More than 30% of Vermont’s native bee species are “critically imperiled or imperiled,” and beekeepers often report losing more than half their colonies over winter.
Farmers rely on pollinators to deliver food to Vermonters and beyond. Crops like tomatoes, pumpkins, apples and blueberries are just a few local staples that depend on pollination services that the USDA values in the billions of dollars. Without pollinators, our food system would falter. And many of our farmers and beekeepers would be unable to earn a living.
These toxic pesticides mostly come from colorful coatings applied to seeds sold to farmers. Neonicotinoid-treated corn and soybean seeds dominate Vermont’s working landscape. Yet, study after study shows that farmers who buy these seeds see little or no benefit.
Worse, neonicotinoids cost farmers more than money. More than 90% of the neonicotinoids applied to seeds enter surrounding waters, soils, plants, and air. Once there, the pesticides kill beneficial insects, like pollinators. Predator insects that feast on pests also suffer. The result is counterintuitive: seed treatments designed to curb pests can make pest problems worse.
In response to these findings, agribusiness is peddling misinformation, just like Big Tobacco before it. So much so that the European Academies Science Advisory Council describes “industry campaigns to maintain markets for pesticides through extensive lobbying, marketing and manipulation” as a major barrier to stemming unnecessary pesticide use.
Agribusiness knows that these seeds damage the environment and do little for farmers who already struggle to make ends meet. But agribusiness also knows that bad products are profitable if they continue to sell.
Some jurisdictions have seen through this charade. The European Commission banned the outdoor use of major neonicotinoids after finding that their use “could no longer be considered safe due to the identified risk to bees.” Quebec requires farmers who want to use neonicotinoid-treated seeds to get a prescription from an agronomist before they do. (Most farmers haven’t needed to). Ontario requires farmers to complete integrated pest management training, which emphasizes using pesticides as a last resort. And New York state just passed legislation that curbs most neonicotinoid-treated seeds.
As expected, seed company warnings of failed harvests and disrupted seed markets have proved false. For example, Quebec’s farmers have not experienced any crop losses related to the province’s restrictions. Moreover, the same companies that claimed they’d have trouble transitioning their seed catalogs away from neonicotinoids quickly pivoted and now offer farmers alternatives.
Last legislative session, the General Assembly directed the Agency of Agriculture to work with the state’s Agriculture Innovations Board to develop best management practices for farmers using neonicotinoid-treated seeds. But the Board recommended research and education instead, and the Agency misleadingly claimed that Vermont’s beekeeping industry is thriving, until beekeepers corrected them.
Now, Vermont’s legislators can solve this problem by supporting the Pollinator Protection Bill (H. 706). It prohibits the use of most neonicotinoid-treated seeds and begins a smooth transition to alternatives. An emergency exemption allows Vermont’s Agency of Natural Resources and Agency of Agriculture to lift the prohibition if the seed industry fails to provide farmers with a sufficient supply of alternatives or if enforcing the ban would cause farmers financial hardship. Not only that, but the bill gives farmers, service providers, and seed companies several years to prepare for the prohibition to take effect.
Neonicotinoid-treated seeds provide little benefit and threaten our pollinators. Now is the time for legislators to protect Vermont’s farms and food system by supporting H.706.
